Cleaning utility

[Joyce London]

Any suggestions for a good cleaner-utility?

 

[honestone]

There is not just one "do it all" program out there. It actually takes some effort on your part, along with some software. Here is what I do/use:

1. On a daily basis, I am always doing some disk cleanup. Most of the time that entails having deleted EMails permanently removed. I use Outlook 2016 as my EMial client, and there is a simple keyboard combination that accomplishes this (I just have to highlight all the EMails I want to permanently remove, hold down the shift key, and press the delete key. That does it). Not sure what method does this for other EMail clients, but one would think it could be done.

Also, whenever I download a new version of a program, I install it, test it out, store it, and get rid of the prior version. For example, earlier today a new Sierra-compatible version of Onyx came out. So, I downloaded, installed it, tested it (worked of course), move the downloaded file to the Onyx folder that is within a folder I have entitled "Useful Software", and then got rid of the prior version.

2. The two programs I use (and depend upon) are Onyx, and Tech Tool Pro. Onyx is more of a disk cleanup utility, whereas Tech Tool Pro actually does 3 tasks well: disk cleanup, disk maintenance, and (if needed) disk repairs. I use Onyx and Tech Tool Pro once a week (typically on a Saturday), along with SuperDuper! for my backups. I do this for both of my Macs, and I have been following this procedure for so long that it feels like second nature to me. I rarely, if ever, have issues.

3. It also helps to keep a good amount of free space on your drive/partition/partitions. For both of my Macs, I am using less than the amount of disk space of each SSD. While that might seem "crazy", actually it allows me to be able to download either some large files, or a number of files (most of those are movies and/or TV series). I of course do not leave them on my internal drive for long, typically moving them to my external drives (I have each of those external drives partitioned).

4. Finally, either when a new Mac OS comes out (or sometimes for an "within a Mac OS" update, or an emergency, I use Disk Utility to Erase and Format the internal drive on the respective machine (for an OS update/new version, I do this for both machines). Of course prior to doing this, I already have a recent bootable SuperDuper! backup, and also the applicable Mac OS installer file.

So, that is my process. Some folks might think that some of it is "over kill", and that's fine. But it works well for me, and as I mentioned above, it is second nature to me.

There are other equivalent programs available that can accomplish the same thing. For Onyx, there is also Coctail, an excellent program that does everything Onyx does. But, it is not free. For Tech Tool Pro, there is the infamous Disk Warrior. That program has been known to do some repairs that other programs can't do. Like Tech Tool Pro, it has been around for a long, long time, and is a solid performer.

 

[honestone]

I forgot to mention something else. When you want to remove an application from your system, download, install, and use the excellent freeware program AppCleaner, available from here:

https://freemacsoft.net/appcleaner/

As you can see, it finds just about all the files associated with the app you are deleting. Again, another free and excellent tool for keeping your Mac "lean, mean, and clean".

 

[Joyce London]

There is not just one "do it all" program out there. It actually takes some effort on your part, along with some software. Here is what I do/use:

1. On a daily basis, I am always doing some disk cleanup. Most of the time that entails having deleted EMails permanently removed. I use Outlook 2016 as my EMial client, and there is a simple keyboard combination that accomplishes this (I just have to highlight all the EMails I want to permanently remove, hold down the shift key, and press the delete key. That does it). Not sure what method does this for other EMail clients, but one would think it could be done.

Also, whenever I download a new version of a program, I install it, test it out, store it, and get rid of the prior version. For example, earlier today a new Sierra-compatible version of Onyx came out. So, I downloaded, installed it, tested it (worked of course), move the downloaded file to the Onyx folder that is within a folder I have entitled "Useful Software", and then got rid of the prior version.

2. The two programs I use (and depend upon) are Onyx, and Tech Tool Pro. Onyx is more of a disk cleanup utility, whereas Tech Tool Pro actually does 3 tasks well: disk cleanup, disk maintenance, and (if needed) disk repairs. I use Onyx and Tech Tool Pro once a week (typically on a Saturday), along with SuperDuper! for my backups. I do this for both of my Macs, and I have been following this procedure for so long that it feels like second nature to me. I rarely, if ever, have issues.

3. It also helps to keep a good amount of free space on your drive/partition/partitions. For both of my Macs, I am using less than the amount of disk space of each SSD. While that might seem "crazy", actually it allows me to be able to download either some large files, or a number of files (most of those are movies and/or TV series). I of course do not leave them on my internal drive for long, typically moving them to my external drives (I have each of those external drives partitioned).

4. Finally, either when a new Mac OS comes out (or sometimes for an "within a Mac OS" update, or an emergency, I use Disk Utility to Erase and Format the internal drive on the respective machine (for an OS update/new version, I do this for both machines). Of course prior to doing this, I already have a recent bootable SuperDuper! backup, and also the applicable Mac OS installer file.

So, that is my process. Some folks might think that some of it is "over kill", and that's fine. But it works well for me, and as I mentioned above, it is second nature to me.

There are other equivalent programs available that can accomplish the same thing. For Onyx, there is also Coctail, an excellent program that does everything Onyx does. But, it is not free. For Tech Tool Pro, there is the infamous Disk Warrior. That program has been known to do some repairs that other programs can't do. Like Tech Tool Pro, it has been around for a long, long time, and is a solid performer.

 

[Joyce London]

Terrific advice. Thanks. (*_*)
(I use Find Any File for app removal - never knew there were so many pieces to delete!)

 

[honestone]

Yeah, it is amazing. I actually have another one called AppZapper that does the same as AppCleaner (and I suspect Find Any File). AppCleaner is actually free, whereas AppZapper and Find Any File are not.

There was one instance, though, where AppCleaner did not find every piece for a program I was deleting. So, I also use EasyFind for my searches (prefer it over Spotlight, as it uses less resources), and it found the remaining pieces. But, AppCleaner is fine for me.

 

[Joyce London]

Yeah, it is amazing. I actually have another one called AppZapper that does the same as AppCleaner (and I suspect Find Any File). AppCleaner is actually free, whereas AppZapper and Find Any File are not.

There was one instance, though, where AppCleaner did not find every piece for a program I was deleting. So, I also use EasyFind for my searches (prefer it over Spotlight, as it uses less resources), and it found the remaining pieces. But, AppCleaner is fine for me.

 

[Joyce London]

I used AppZapper for many years, but was astounded what Find any file found.